He must be off

I have waited until after someone replaced Gary Burbank on 700 WLW in Cincinnati to write anything about it. I was still holding out a small bit of hope it was a stunt, and Gary would be back on the air after his usual holiday vacation.

However, now I know how people who were loyal watchers of “Friends,” or “Seinfeld,” or “M*A*S*H” or some other long running show left when it ended. I was actually upset for a couple of weeks when I realized he was really, honestly going to retire. I mean, really upset. I woke up in the morning thinking, “Only two more weeks of Gary Burbank,” and then, “Only one more week of Gary Burbank,” and so on.

I started listening sometime in 1992 or 1993. I remember riding in the car with my dad to Columbus, and we started off listening to Mike McConnell. I had been listening to him in the car a little bit, and enjoyed his show.

I wasn’t paying close attention, though, and after a while, I noticed the tone of the program had changed. These guys on the air were having fun! It wasn't McConnell any more, it was someone else.

Obviously, it had passed 2 p.m., and Gary Burbank was on the air. After that, I continued to listen regularly, becoming a very avid fan of the program.

I credit Burbank and a chiming clock in the hallway for helping me complete my Master’s thesis in 1995.

Every day, I sat down at my Apple IIC clone with a pile of library books and started typing. Normally, I had the radio on in the background. By mid-afternoon, I was sick of working, but Burbank’s show provided me the slight distraction I needed to not realize I was tired of researching and typing.

Without his program keeping my spirits up, who knows how long I’d have taken to finish that thing?

The chiming clock, by the way, was useful in that whenever I wasn’t actively typing, I’d hear it bong. For some reason, that made me feel guilty – there went another half hour I didn’t do anything. There went an hour.

I guess you could say the clock prodded me along so I’d get to work, and Burbank kept the atmosphere light and fun so I’d keep working. Just hearing his theme song come on at a little after 2 p.m. always made me smile and relax a little bit. It still did, right up until the end. I always knew I’d be enjoying the next few hours.

I always loved the sports soap-opera parody shows, “All My Bengals,” and “The Reds and the Restless.” These were some of the most quoted bits from his shows.

One of the funniest things I ever heard involved Gary making fun of Paul Harvey. Harvey’s “The Rest of the Story” show came on at about 2:50 p.m. every afternoon. One day, all of a sudden, Gary stopped it, started playing game show music, and, in his best Gary Owens voice, announced it was time to play, “What’s the Point, Paul?”

I think people all over America probably want to ask Paul Harvey that every single day.

Anyway, Gary’s point was that callers could call in and try to guess “the rest of the story.”

I was a caller at least four times on the 4 p.m. game show “Sports or Consequences.” I won once, and received an official “Sports or Consequences” mug and the rules of the game. (I know where the mug is, but I have no idea when happened to the rules after they were removed from my bedside stand 10 years later when I moved.)

The question I won with was, “Who holds the single-season record for double plays turned as a second baseman?” The answer was, at the time, Jerry Priddy of the New York Yankees. It may have since been broken. Gary even said it was a good question.

I also got a letter read on the air. I wrote it to the stand-ins, at the time led by Roger Nailer, when Gary was on vacation for three weeks.

It didn’t get read until Gary got back. I had addressed the letter to “Roger and the gang,” to which Gary replied, “Boy, maybe I have been gone a long time!”

Nevertheless, I was happy to be acknowledged.

When I started working at the Advertiser-Tribune in 1996, I had a co-worker who had lived in Cincinnati and had been a regular Burbank listener. We used to recount all the old bit Gary did, and I’d tell him about the new stuff I’d listened to on my way to work that day.

In recent years, I had drifted away from listening to the show every day. I started tuning to the Cleveland stations more and more to hear talk about the Indians and Browns.

Then, in 2006, I moved to Louisville. The Cleveland stations didn’t come in any more. But 700 did. I started to listen to the local Louisville programs, but Burbank was significantly more interesting than anything else.

My wife, Hallie, and I were driving from Louisville back home to Fostoria and Toledo one Friday afternoon, and I started listening to Burbank when Heywood Banks was on. I always enjoyed Heywood’s appearances, and I thought maybe Hallie would like to hear his songs.

As we passed through Dayton, I decided to call “Sports or Consequences” and ask them to name the major league baseball player who had hit a grand slam home run on his first pitch in his first at-bat in the major leagues in 2006. The answer was Kevin Kouzmanoff, then of the Cleveland Indians.

They guessed for a long time, far more guesses than the Sufficianados are supposed to be allowed, but hey, they can do what they want – they’re the Sufficianados. Gary said was it was a boring question, they got the answer and I didn’t win anything, but it was fun anyway.

That time, I think I was on the precipice of getting blown up, but I didn’t. This entailed Gary playing an explosion and hanging up on you because you violated the rules or asked a question that was minutiae or just had indigestion or something. I never got blown up when I called the program. That’s more than many callers can say.

That was may last call to the program.

Of course, about the time I started really looking forward to hearing him every day again, I found out he was retiring at the end of 2007.

I listed to all of the last show, and I was happy to hear that Andy MacWilliams, Bob Trumpy, Doc Wolfe and many of the voices from past shows were there.

When Gary signed off for the last time at 6 p.m. Dec. 21, and the news came on. It was amazing how normal it felt, not like something important had ended.

The radio station just continued as usual, but it would be without the Gary Burbank Program from now on.

As I said, it upset me, but I know that life must go on. TV shows get canceled. Pet goldfish die and get flushed down the toilet. All the Christmas presents are unwrapped and there’s wrapping paper and torn boxes everywhere to clean up. OK, that’s not making any sense, but you know what I mean.

I am happy Gary can relax in retirement now. But I’ll still miss knowing every day at 3 p.m., I can tune in and hear his theme song, or at 4:30 p.m., no matter where I am, I can call “Sports or Consequences,” and receive a lesson in how life is not always fair.

All I can say is this: Thanks Gary for the many hours of enjoyment, and often enlightenment, your program gave me. I am already missing it.

I must be off!